1 3 2 THROUGH THE DARK CONTINENT. fJune r> 1877.1
L Mowa. J
The boat had been in a leaky condition ever
since she had received the shock at the Upper
Mowa, and her constant portage by the falls of
the Livingstone, the constant change from dry
heat to wet, had almost ruined her, yet we
persisted in caulking and repairing her. Some
of the natives, observing my anxiety to render
her water-tight, offered to bring me a substance
which, they said, would be effectual for the
purpose. In a few hours they had brought me
a mixture of india-rubber and palm-butter. We
experimented with it instantly, but it was a very
poor substitute for pitch, and I expressed my
dissatisfaction with it.
Then a nephew of Manwana offered to show
his friend Kacheche something else which would
be much better. Accordingly, the next morning,
at 10 A.M. of the 1st June, Kacheche and the
native brought about thirty pounds of bees-wax,
a very dark substance, which, had it not been
for the diminutive bees which clung to it, might
have been mistaken for pitch. Subsequently I
proceeded myself to the source of the supply,
and discovered about a hundredweight of beeswax
attached to a lofty fragment of rock near
Massassa Falls. These bees are of a dark brown
colour, short and dumpy, about one-half the
length of the ordinary honey-bee. At several
places between Massassa and Mowa there were
similar large secretions of wax on the cliffy rocks.
rTune J 1877-1 PRODUCTIONS o f m ow a .
[ M o w à . J
Another valuable article of commerce besides
the bees-wax and india-rubber found here was
the gum copal— not, however, amongst the
possessions of the natives. We were first attracted
to it at Kalulu Falls by the great quantities
discovered between the rocks. One man collected
about fifty pounds of it, under the impression
that he would be able, on reaching the coast,
to sell it for a few pice. Poor fellow! He had
but little idea of what was in Store for him and
all of us, before we shoqld arrive at the sea.
The appearance of the substance proved that it
had been long immersed in water. My own
opinion is that it is fossilized gum carried down
by the Livingstone river. On Cheandoah Island,
a cake 15 lbs. in weight was discovered, besides
many small pieces of two or three pounds’
weight, of the mellow red and pale white variety.
The Babwendé are too rich in palm-oil to
employ the gum, frankincense, and myrrh, and
the other resins of the Burseracese, as the Wh-
regga and natives of Karuru do, for lights. Of
india-rubber the Mowa possess large quantities,
as their wooded ravines and the right slopes of
the great river furnish them with inexhaustible
supplies. One enterprising fellow carried one
load of it to sell to thé Ba-Zombo, but he received
so little cloth for it that he repented of
the speculation.
The commercial enterprise of the Babwende